h guilty of practises more
shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this
very hour.

Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies
and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search
out every abuse and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the
side of the every-day practises of this nation, and you will say with me
that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns
without a rival.

SHOULD COLORED MEN BE SUBJECT TO THE PAINS AND PENALTIES OF THE FUGITIVE
SLAVE LAW?[5]

BY CHARLES H. LANGSTON

CHARLES H. LANGSTON, _a native of Ohio, was the first to counsel
resistance to the Fugitive Slave Act, and lost no opportunity
himself to disobey it. He was found guilty of violating the law in
rescuing John Price, an alleged fugitive from service in Kentucky.
This speech is his answer to the question of the judge why the
sentence should not be pronounced upon him. He was sentenced to one
hundred and twenty days' imprisonment, and fined $100.00 and costs,
amounting to $872.72._

[Note 5: Speech of Charles H. Langston before the United States
District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, May 12, 1859.
Delivered when about to be sentenced for rescuing a man from slavery.]

After a trial of twenty-three days in the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Ohio, Hiram V. Willson presiding, and at a
cost to the United States Government of more than two thousand dollars,
C. H. Langston was found guilty of violating the Fugitive Slave Law, by
rescuing John Price, an alleged fugitive from service in Kentucky, from
the custody of one, Anderson Jennings, at Wellington, on the 13th day of
September, 1858.

Mr. Langston was sentenced to twenty days' imprisonment in the jail of
Cuyahoga county, and also to pay a fine of one hundred dollars and a
portion of the costs of prosecution, amounting to nine hundred and
seventy-two dollars and seventy cents.

BILL OF COSTS

Fine and bill of costs as copied from the Journal of the Court:

Fine $100.00
Clerk's fees 32.10
Marshal's fees 30.40
United States' witnesses 131.10
Docket fees 20.00
-------
Total $972.70

On the morning of the 12th of May, 1859, C. H. Langston was brought into